The new Cityjet/Air France schedules don't seem completely set up yet (like Milan times were still missing the last time I checked) but there appear to be at least two night stopping aircraft, and if there is an early morning departure to Milan that would make it three.

Is Cityjet setting up a crew base at London City ? If I am correct Scot already have a small base but this will be the first jet basing. How many crew will be here ?

I'm off at a grossly early hour tomorrow to Heathrow to get to Belfast City. Roll on the new Scot BHD service (although the times give a bit of a short business day in Belfast).

Hi all just seen a programme Flight Deck with BAE 146-200 and it going into LCY and I was wondering can the Fokker 70 land at LCY,If so has anyone flown it into LCY ?:confused:

Regards
JAmes

The F70 operated into London City for a few years in the late 1990s on the Air France flights from Paris. From the ground it was a noisy little thing in comparison to the 146. It was replaced by the franchise arrangement Air france struck with Cityjet to use 146s instead in AF livery, which also gave about 20 more seats per flight.

Air France replaced the Fokker 70 because of performance issues, mainly related to braking in wet conditions IIRC. These problems were the triggering event to join forces with Cityjet who had a more suitable aircraft available.

By the way, the Fokker 70 needs a few modifications for LCY ops, mainly software-wise. the onyl aircraft modified as such are the ex Air Littoral Fokker 70s which are flying with Regional, if memory serves.

IOM
 

Any of you guys herd anything about the BA LCY-IOM rumoured start date:confused: :confused:

Don't know where you heard the rumour of a start date but as far as I'm aware it isn't and never was starting!

Who knows - with all these rumours about BA being interested in taking over VLM to expand the LCY operation, BA could inherit a IOM route....

Rubbish! BA take over another airline? Crikey that would never happen again surely......really ? You reckon? Are they SO stupid? They are? Oh sorry........I am so naive.

Where've you heard that then? Oh, go on...

...aha. Further research suggests that "industry sources" told the Evening Standard this, but not much more.

A BA F50 that could work, Hope they dont take them over then all 22 F50 will be gone:( I see on the BA cityflyer post they have ordered some A318?

James

That "order" would seem to be news to BA and to Airbus!

Given that the person who posted this sensational rumour in the Cabin crew forum is also under the impression that VLM is Dutch, I suspect that a little inaccuracy has crept in. BA mainline, BA cityflyer, A320s, A318s, what's the difference? ;)

(Note: BA *could* decide to order A318s in the future. They have a pile of A319 options which could be converted to other types in the family. But they have not ordered A318s yet, and frankly if I were launching a new operation at LCY I'd want to be reasonably sure that it was going to work out and hit my 10% operating margin target before I signed up for a few hundred million $ worth of rather niche-y aircraft.)

Why not ? It will be the easiest way to get slots at slot-constrained LCY, the expertise of an airline that has been running a succesful operation for more than 15 years from LCY and a network that certainly must be of interest to anyone who is seriously interested in developing LCY into a new market in addition to LHR and LGW. Plus, on most routes VLM is now facing the problem that they require a larger type of aircraft than the Fokker 50.

This is from a Dutch website:

= A VLM spokeswoman has said that there are no take-over talks and VLM is unaware of any interest by BA. VLM's owner (Panta, also the owner of Denim) has not been available for comment, BA has refused to make a comment.

You have to hope none of this about VLM is true, or is BA going to go for the record in :mad: up regional airlines. Maybe they could put DE in charge.

Manx Crab
Thats very unfair. DE has been a driving force in the expansion of UK regional airlines - Air Southwest, Eastern and Loganair for example have all profited from his and his employers wisdom of offloading profitable routes - just a shame the regional airline he was meant to be running went down the pan in the process.......:rolleyes:

Are they not getting two more F50 this year:confused: And has the A318 got rights now to land at LCY?

Regards
James

A318 has been certified for LCY ,I believe, but there's nowhere to park it yet!

Yes, but they are now expanding outside LCY, e.g. with the new ANR-MAN route. This is pretty much what their CEO said in an interview last year. Given the current situation - only destinations less than 500mls away being feasible with Fokker 50, almost all promising destiations within this perimeter being served now and the difficulties to get peak time slots at LCY, growth will focus on markets outside LCY until the airport has added capacity and the airline sorted out its future fleet.

VLM could easily fill larger aircraft during peak times on most of their routes, but so far had to try to squeeze in additional Fokker 50 flights. While frequency is on eof VLM's main selling points, it does not really make sense to have aircraft departing in 15minute intervals. With routes like AMS, RTM, MAN now hat 9+ flights on weekdays, it certainly would help to have a larger type of aircraft for the mornings and evenings.

Jersey
 

A senior person from Jersey Airport managment spoke on Monday last and said, there could be more London City-Jersey flights, they are working on it at the moment any ideas on this or comments.

The Manchester flight into City in the morning modnay to friday goes down to Jersey and has a seven hour lay over, is this where they are looking at doing something like operate the aircraft back to City in the morning and then down to Jersey to make good the late afternoon?

Or are they looking at weekend service?

The only way the 318 will have parking space is if they fill in the dock to the left of stand 1. This is on the airports expansion plans but time scale is a bit sketchy!

I though that the 146 was being used by VLM for the Rotterdam flight??

Here is their artists impression of their new toy:

http://www.flyvlm.com/myImages/04/010/003/jet_small.jpg

The BAe 146 is for four of the RTM rotations, LUX was just a rumour. The 146 will be operated by Flightline, so it is no real long-term decision fleet-wise.

It's only a matter of time - the airport has already had the planning permission for I believe, 5 new stands built in the dock.

Who knows, a parallel taxiway might be in the equation too?

/S :ok:

The proposed 5 additional stands A318-sized will provide at least a new hold to the east of Charlie (so presumably it will be Delta), at the east end of the apron extension, so at least time taken for backtracking will be reduced. However a full length parallel taxiway is not part of the plan.

Remember the current stands were actually sized for Dash-7s !

It will be a big job as presumably there will need to be a terminal building extension to the east as well, the current departure lounge is too small at peak times, the security is getting stretched, and there is nowhere currently for airline business lounges which a number of operators at LCY feel is a missing item for their premium pax there.

This is from the www.lcacc.org

http://www.pbase.com/kbmphotography/image/75881867.jpg

Nose-in parking.

That will add to the turnround time (and presumably costs) compared to the present arrangements. How many more gates, if any, will it make available in the current area ? Presumably there would have to be significant alterations to the terminal building if the gate spacing is changed.

It will also make access to aircraft rear doors more convoluted for the pax.

I am surprised that the unused space between the gate area and the DLR station is not used for an extension of retail space, for dedicated airline lounges and an enlarged waiting area. Should be possible without too much investment and the space is available. I know that there are plans for such an extension at a later stage, but given the unbearable situation airside at peak times, they really should fast track this before the background of additional flights by BA Cityflyer and Cityjet.

Best of luck to VLM when it is bought by BA and the slots handed to Cityflyer!!

Hope VLM stay as they are and not taking over by BA:ugh: Plus dont the VLM CEO own Denim Air and Rekkof? Maybe if VLM did get taking over by BA he replace VLM with Denim Air?:confused:
Here is what there plains are for LCY. http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...future3lge.jpg

All the Best
James:cool:

BA/VLM
 

would VLM ever sell out to BA or anyone else? LCY is their home base in effect. Surely they wouldn't?

BA are just in the throes of dumping all their commuter-style propeller aircraft operations through their various franchises. It will take a couple of years at least therefore before their Grand Old Duke Of York style "Now we buy them for £100m, now we sell them for £1" attitude to smaller aircraft operations cycles round again and Willie's successor has the brainwave of buying up smaller airlines like VLM to operate under the BA name.

Just in case you think I am being unduly cynical I can remember BA transferring their local services to smaller airlines in the 1960s, then building up their local services again in the 1970s, then dumping them all around 1982 when all the BA Viscounts were withdrawn, then building it all up again. Then in the 1980s they disposed of their smaller routes at Gatwick, many to the independent City Flyer, which at the end of the process they then purchased. And currently .......

Meanwhile back to today at LCY we are at the start date (Mon 26 March) of the greatly expanded Air France operation at London City with no hard information on what's going on. Has anyone booked on the "new services" ? Are they starting "later" ? Is just Belfast starting on Monday (with no publicity it seems they will doubtless have minimal loads) ?

Heard recently, that in the peak evening period, there are soon going to be 32 aircraft fighting for 14 stands!

Just sit back and enjoy.

Any chance that the Flightline 146 flying for VLM to RTM is a former AirUK machine, that would be ironic, as I seem to remember those birds flying the LCY route, many moons ago...

Flying out of LCY on Friday, I noted a SAS Q400 at the biz apron. Such a long beast squeezed into a corner of the tiny apron was a pretty unsual sight. As there was another Q400 on the ground, I suppose it was tech ?

Yes, aircraft was tech. Departed I believe on Friday, and was replaced by a 146! :ok:

WHBM its all about the slots!! BA dont require Fokker 50s and turbo prop operations. What they do require, if they are serious at LCY is more peak time slots, thats what they need, and VLM have them. So are we gonna see how serious Willy is about LCY? I know he has stated that BACF has to show a 10% profit but will he speculate to accumilate?

Belfast started yesterday, the other services (ZRH, GVA, MAD, NCE) start Apr 9. The DND/EDI codeshare with Scot will be later still as the challenges of the ongoing AF/KL reservation system integration have led to an AF edict that no new free-flow codeshares can be implemented for at least a couple of months. :rolleyes: And Milan... well, watch this space.

Meanwhile the AF "forward bookings are for wimps" advertising/publicity machine is revving up but yes, there will certainly be very light loads at first.

Is BHD being sold by Scot Airways or just by AF/Cityjet

BHD
 

It is not available to book on the Scotairways website and when attempting to book through Expedia it comes up as an AF route.

Bit strange, I would have thought that Scotairways would have liked to have marketed it themselves as well to increase awareness and their cut.

What was the loads like on it today? Unless they have launched it for someone I can't see the loads being that impressive as it hasn't been advertised much to be honest

Well I came through BHD (BMI to/from Heathrow) last Wednesday 21 March and with 4 days to go there was no sign anywhere there of the new service.

Even the London City website has the flights (AF 5150-55 series) shown on its arrival/departure pages with blank for a destination ! Look at it today, you will see, this is the third day like this. What a bizarre, lack of publicity approach.

A recent newspaper article reported that D328s would only be used on BHD until September when they would be replaced by RJ85s - if this is the plan,it would explain why flights can't be booked via Scot Airways own website - they will only be operating for Cityjet on this route for a few months.

BTW, the last flight yesterday into BHD had a total of 4 pax - not very promising!